For all you know, somebody else gave her the $20 in the place of a $1 and she didn't notice. Her till at the end of the shift might have ended up being $19 over. In the world of cashiering, that's as bad as being $19 under, and from my own experience, will get you disciplined just as badly.

As a former cashier, I personally would be okay with you returning it to customer service. I'd be willing to get chewed out for that mistake and deal with the consequences. There are a lot of scams people try to pull on cashiers, and had you come through my line and given me a twenty, even with a good reason for it, I think I'd be concerned you were up to something.

Normally when somebody claims that a cashier cheated them out of $, customer service would shut down the line, would pull up the computer records for what should be in the till, and would count out the drawer to double check. Depending on the store, it's very possible that they'd do the same for this situation.

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Tact: The ability to tell some one to go to hell in such a way that he looks forward to the trip.

I think you were fine. I've cashiered at a number of jobs (one grocery store, and a few food service). If she's normally very reliable and has no history of problems, she'll probably be fine. She may get a talking to, or some sort of official warning, maybe, but I'd be surprised if a one time thing gets her fired. If there is a pattern with her, then she's probably better off in a different field anyway, and it's certainly not your fault.

On the other hand, if you hadn't returned, she may have come up $20 short, which may well have been docked from her paycheck, as well as being written up. She'd get in trouble anyway, at least this way she isn't also out $20. Going through her line would have been confusing, time consuming, and seeing her exchange money, but no goods, may have been looked at suspiciously.

I really wouldn't worry about it. They're not going to go through the hassle of being short staffed for awhile, interviewing a bunch of people, doing background checks, and training a new employee over one $20 mistake. Maybe $100, or a pattern of $20 mistakes, but not just one. Businesses tend to assume it'll happen now and then, and account for human error, that's why they have set amounts that will be forgiven ($5 in my jobs, as far as I can remember), and a policy for reimbursement for bigger mistakes. It happens, they know it happens, and I'd be really surprised if she lost her job over it.

I think you did just fine. The customer service people were probably surprised to have someone bring back money they were given by mistake, which is a sad commentary on today's world.

About a week ago Mr. Sirius and I took our cats to the vet, and while we were there we purchased some Advantage flea treatment for them. We were supposed to have gotten 5 tubes; we were given 6. The next morning I called the vet's office to tell them about it. I had no problem with paying for the extra tube; we'd certainly use it, and it would save us having to go to the office to buy another one. The receptionist told me I didn't have to pay for it, and thanked me for being so honest.

It's good that you returned it. Probably best that you returned it to customer service as well.

I remember once putting the change in my wallet on kind of auto-pilot and then realizing I'd gotten the wrong change. I went back to the cashier and said:

me: "Excuse me Miss, but you've given me the wrong change. It should have been ..."her: "You got the right change how dare you try and and scam me."me: "Miss, really. You gave me..."her: "If you don't stop bothering me, I'll call the police."me: "So you don't want the extra 10 bucks you gave me back?"

Suddenly she was all sweetness and light. In her defense, I seem to give off an aura of dishonesty or something. Store loss prevention people follow me around from the moment I enter a store until I leave and I really have no idea why. Maybe I look 'shifty' or something.

About a week ago Mr. Sirius and I took our cats to the vet, and while we were there we purchased some Advantage flea treatment for them. We were supposed to have gotten 5 tubes; we were given 6. The next morning I called the vet's office to tell them about it. I had no problem with paying for the extra tube; we'd certainly use it, and it would save us having to go to the office to buy another one. The receptionist told me I didn't have to pay for it, and thanked me for being so honest.

Both Advantage and Frontline will run specials where you get an extra tube if you buy a certain number. I bought a 6-pack of Frontline on Saturday, and got 2 extra doses. Maybe you didn't get anything you weren't entitled to.